Thursday night is here, and the Detroit Lions are hosting NFC North division rival Green Bay Packers at Ford Field in prime time.

The Lions are currently sitting on the NFL’s longest active win streak of 10 games in a row, with the Lions’ last loss dating back to week two vs the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Green Bay in their own right have taken seven of their last eight games with that lone loss coming at the hands of these very Lions in week nine with a final score of 24-14.

Detroit Lions Injury Report:

The list may be shorter if I mention who will be playing in the game on Thursday night. Besides all the names on IR, this week’s list features two of the Lions’ four starters along the defensive line, as well as the first guy off the bench in the rotation. The Lions will be missing DJ Reader, Levi Onwuzurike, and Josh Paschal.

On the other side of the ball, the Lions are much healthier, thankfully, only missing a single starter. That starter however is the second most important position on offense as it is LT Taylor Decker.

Green Bay Packers Injury Report:

Green Bay is pretty beat up as well, though, with fewer long-term injuries than the Lions. The four players of note that they will be missing this week are CB Jaire Alexander, WR Romeo Doubs, LB Edgerrin Cooper, and CB Corey Ballentine.

Detroit Lions Keys to Victory:

This Lions team is built around running the ball using the pride of the team, the offensive line, to move people out of the way and clear lanes for the elite RB duo of Sonic (Jahmyr Gibbs) and Knuckles (David Montgomery). They need to have long scoring drives that eat up the clock and allow their defense to stay resting on the sidelines as much as possible. They do not have the manpower on defense to lose the time of possession battle and come out on top of this prime-time game.

This is not really going out on a limb here, but as always; the turnover battle is important. The Lions’ defense has gotten several takeaways this season, led by the NFL’s interception leader, Kerby Joseph, who, you may remember, in week nine of the season took a Jordan Love interception all the way back for his first career pick-six.

Other than those two things being my most important keys to victory for the Lions, one individual to watch on Thursday night will be new DE Za’Darius Smith who at one point in time played for the Packers. He has so far shown exactly why the Lions went out and traded for him at the deadline. Now it’s time for him to go feast on his former team.

Predictions:

With both teams missing important players on defense, I believe this will come down to which offense can be more consistent. With the Packers missing two CBs and the Lions having St. Brown, Jamo, as well as the previously mentioned run game they will just have too much to deal with for the road team to take on.

In conclusion, I believe the Lions will take home the victory to improve to 12-1 on the season by a final score of 24-17. The run game and home-field advantage will be a little too much for the Packers to handle despite all of the Lions’ missing players.

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